1st or 2nd week of June better?

[underminer]

Just a quick question for planning a trip next June...Crowdwise would it be better to go the first week of June before So Cal APs are blocked or the second week of June when they are blocked? Thanks!

 

[Hojoanaheim]

I say the second week, when So Cal AP's are blocked. A good amount of people that go to Disneyland are AP holders, so on the dates when they are blocked the crowds should be less.

HTH;
Kriss

 

[quinnc19]

Sorry to piggyback, but I am visiting at the same time and was wondering about a touring strategy to deal with the grad nights that are rampant in June.

 

[gottalovepluto]

Sorry to piggyback, but I am visiting at the same time and was wondering about a touring strategy to deal with the grad nights that are rampant in June.

Avoid Disneyland the night of grad parties, do your CA Adventure stuff at that time or eat at a hotel or in downtown Disney or something. If the hours are extended (maybe DL closes at Midnight), hop back into DL after the grad party in DCA starts at 10pm (time I see in current grad nite literature). We found the highest crowd impact was dinner time to party start time when the grads are trying to hit the big rides (Space Mountain, Indy) in DL before all being shuffled over to DCA.

 

[Blue32]

Just a quick question for planning a trip next June...Crowdwise would it be better to go the first week of June before So Cal APs are blocked or the second week of June when they are blocked? Thanks!

Are you sure they will be blocked the 2nd week of June? It seems to me they usually don't block the lower AP's until about the 3rd week of June.

 

[underminer]

Are you sure they will be blocked the 2nd week of June? It seems to me they usually don't block the lower AP's until about the 3rd week of June.

That's what it shows on the block-out calendar on the Disneyland website...

Sorry to piggyback, but I am visiting at the same time and was wondering about a touring strategy to deal with the grad nights that are rampant in June.

I was wondering about that too...traditionally when are grad nights? Is it just weekend nights? At what time do they usually start?

 

[kirstie101]

As of now these are the grad nights, but they can release more if they decide to.
May 13, 15, 16, 18, 26, 27, 29, 30
June 2, 3, 5, 6, 10, 12, 13, 17, 19

On our trip last year we had 2 grad nights and we were fine with them. There will be one during our trip this year. What we did on the grad nights was we spent our day in DCA, as most of the grads head to DL when they first arrive. Then we hopped over to DL after dinner as more grads were starting to pour into DCA then.

 

[gottalovepluto]

I was wondering about that too...traditionally when are grad nights? Is it just weekend nights? At what time do they usually start?

Grad nites are many different days of the week, basically if you're going to Disneyland mid May to mid June you'll hit at least one. You won't actually end up at a grad nite, they are private parties and DCA is closed to the general public during the actual party. What you will be facing is a high increase in the amount of high school seniors in the parks during the day, and especially the night, of the parties. The times and dates are here http://www.wdwinfo.com/disneyland/Events/grad-nights.html

 

[underminer]

Thanks for the reply! So how does grad night work? What time do the kids usually hit the park? I assume they are doing an all nighter but at what time does the park really get crowded?

 

[Butterfly123]

On our last trip we had three grad nights out of a four day trip. The kids started arriving around noon over at Disneyland, so our strategy was to spend the morning at Disneyland and then when it started to get crowded in the afternoon we moved over to DCA. In the evenings we focused on entertainment rather than the big ticket rides because that's where the big lines of kids were. I was really concerned about having so many grad nights on our trip, but it really worked out fine for us. We didn't experience any problems with rowdiness and line jumping.

 

[quinnc19]

Thanks everyone - very helpful!

 

[dnamertz]

Are you sure they will be blocked the 2nd week of June? It seems to me they usually don't block the lower AP's until about the 3rd week of June.

It's only the Southern Cal SELECT AP that is blocked for the summer after June 4th. The Souther Cal AP (non-SELECT) still has active dates through June 25th. Not sure whether more So. Cal. AP holders have the Select vs non-Select AP.